传统与现代——中国古琴艺术面临的挑战

Traditions and Modernity:The Challenges to the Art of Guqin

To strengthen the protection and inheritance of Guqin traditions does not mean that the art of Guqin should not be developed or new works for Guqin should not be composed.As matter of fact,new Guqin works have been composed from time to time since the ancient times, and the art of Guqin has never stopped growing.A judgment on whether the art of Guqin has developed or not can not depend on whether any new works have been composed,but rather on whether these works have reached a certain artistic level.Sometimes,even if it is a new work, its artistic level is average and contains no great values,while some old tunes,when being played,reflect the high level of composition at the times.The present situation shows that quantity of new Guqin works is limited in comparison with ancient tunes,and many of them are far away from the Guqin traditions and have not reached the height of artistic level reflected in ancient tunes,thus have not yet been performed by Guqin players.Various attempts in composing new works should be allowed.It seems senseless to pursue the"originality"and"novelty"in composing Guqin music regardless of the inherent peculiarity and performing traditions of the instrument,taking Guqin as guitar or Guzheng,or to simply follow the ways of"development"and"innovation"of some other Chinese traditional instruments,targeting at piano,rather than taking roots in the rich lands of traditions and employing the original artistic feature of"writing on one’s mind"and the instrumental function of elegance and inner intelligence so as to create new works that may reflect the highest level of the times.